Oakville 21.1 Half Marathon
Oakville, Canada
- Half Marathon, 10K, 5K
- Road (Paved)
- Official race website
Run a beautiful fast, flat and scenic course along the lakeshore in Oakville, exploring some of the picturesque neighbourhoods along the way. This is the perfect course and time of year to plan to run a personal best and/or bring the whole family for a day of active fun! The … MORE
Local Historical Weather (Oct 04):
| 2025 | 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | |
| H (°C) | 28 | 20 | 25 | 17 | 16 |
| L (°C) | 14 | 10 | 15 | 3 | 15 |
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2 Countries in 1 weekend
I have already done a half marathon in Ontario. However I was visiting my brother in Buffalo, NY this weekend and really wanted a double with the Mighty Niagara Half … MORE
I have already done a half marathon in Ontario. However I was visiting my brother in Buffalo, NY this weekend and really wanted a double with the Mighty Niagara Half that was on Saturday and found this half across the border less than 2 hours from Buffalo. It is located in a Toronto suburb and like I said was a short drive from Buffalo. I did stay at a Holiday Inn in Oakville as I didn’t want to deal with border patrol race morning and this race had a pretty early start. There was good pre-race communication with a detailed athlete’s guide. However the emails went to my spam (not a complaint about the race just advice if you are not getting emails to check your spam folder). Packet pick-up is Thursday in Toronto or Saturday in Oakville. However there was the option to pay for race day packet pick-up. I opted for this so I could spend more time in Buffalo Saturday. For the race you park in a large bus station parking lot and shuttle to the park where the race starts. I arrived quite early as I had to get my packet and it was easy. There was one big issue and that was the park was really, really dark. This was only the second year for the race and while it was overall a well done race there were a few “growing pains” like this. I did hear the race organizers discuss they didn’t realize how dark it would be and would need to figure out how to fix this in the future. Packet pick-up was easy but one thing that kind of annoyed me is they let people pick up their packets who did not sign up for the race day packet pick-up. Maybe there were extenuating circumstances but I didn’t think that was very cool as race day packet pick-up was between $20-$30 USD. The packet included the bib and a white tech shirt. I don’t usually wear white shirts but it’s a nice design. They did have a bag check area so I checked the shirt in the plastic bag it was in so I didn’t have to carry it. There were porta potties at the start. Lines were a bit long but not more than usual. The start was well organized as we were assigned waves and there were pacers. I was in the last wave. The slowest pacer however was I think 2:30. Definitely not anyone I could keep up with the second half in a weekend. The race starts at 7:30 and the waves leave every 3 minutes. The only negative is the race cutoff of 3 hours is from the start so the finish line closes at 11:00Am. This means the last wave has more of a 3:20 time limit. I still thought I’d be fine (and I was) but I’d like that 10 minute buffer. Luckily we went through efficiently so I crossed the line right about 7:39. The course is fairly nice. It is mostly an out and back with a small loop at the end. Most of it is through neighborhoods which is fine but a bit boring. There is a part in the middle through a park with views of Lake Ontario and the prettiest part is the loop at the halfway point which goes through a beautiful park with beautiful views. The best part of the course is only in the half marathon so sign up for the longer race. I liked the earlier start today compared to yesterday as weather was perfect with the early start. The course is pretty flat. Not quite as flat as yesterday but a couple hundred feet of elevation gain. No real hills. Just some inclines and declines. It was mostly well marked except one part in the park was confusing on the way back and a runner near me went the wrong way which led to some confusing. I think I lost a minute or 2 figuring out where to go but I did figure it out. There were Km markers every Km which was great since I am working on trying to pace myself with Km markers. My goal is 8 min/km pace but I knew that was unrealistic given I pushed myself hard yesterday so I wanted to maintain a 9 min/km pace which should be the minimum pace I need to maintain to make sure I make all the time cutoffs in Tokyo. I was very successful at this strategy and had an exactly 9 min/km pace even with the getting slightly lost in the park. There were sufficient aid stations with water and gatorade. No nutrition at the aid stations but that was in the guide and there was some spectators handing out some fruits and things. It was a medium sized race. There weren’t a ton of back of packets but I had no issues being in the back and I was generally always running near someone. The streets stayed closed or partially closed the entire race. I finished just under 3:10. I would have loved another under 3 hour finish but my finishing time at this race plus Mighty Niagara was my fastest combined finishing time for a double half weekend since my stress fracture so I was happy. The medal is nice with fall foliage. It is smaller than a lot of my half marathon medals but bigger than most of my Canadian medals. There were bagels and some other post race food. One other production critique is there were long lines back to the shuttle. I couldn’t wait very long if I wanted to shower before check out from my hotel so I took an uber back to the parking lot. We then drove back to Buffalo and I flew out of Buffalo Sunday evening. Overall this was a nice race but I wouldn’t call it a “must run.” I’d recommend it to locals or even semi-locals such as Buffalonians. I assume you can find more exciting destination races in Toronto and Niagara Falls for your Ontario race if you are doing the Provinces but if you want to get NY and ON in one weekend, I doubt you will find a better or more convenient double than Mighty Niagara and this one. I also think they will like continue to improve this race and fix the minor issues as it becomes a more established race.